Undead shopaholic Betsy Taylor has found that being a vampire queen has more problems than perks. It may be easy to find blood in the dark of night, but try finding a strawberry smoothie. And employees at her nightclub Scratch have been giving her nothing but grief since she killed their former boss.

But Betsy’s “life” takes an interesting turn when her father lets it slip that Betsy has a long-lost half sister. Now twenty years old, this woman just so happens to be the devil’s daughter – and destined to rule the world…
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You just never knew when a totally normal vampire
errand would end in a bloodbath with severed-limb soap.

My Review

Undead and Unappreciated is the third book of the Undead series. Betsy’s adventures continue, and finally she finds – I guess it’s neither a secret nor a surprise – ‘happily ever after’ with Eric Sinclair.

Betsy and Eric

Everybody knew my views on the subject. They had to be as tired of hearing about it as I was of bitching about it.

After the prologue, and especially after the lines above, I was so afraid that Betsy would be whining throughout the book that she didn’t want to be neither the queen, nor a vampire, not even the consort of Sinclair. So I was very relieved when she finally pulled herself together, and saw daylight (literally).

Six months of pushing him away, and when I succeeded, I was sick about it.

Thank God! Here is the development I wished for!
Betsy is still acting crazy, her thoughts and behavior are rhapsodic:

“Why don’t you mind your own fucking business for once?” I snapped. “If I want to take my sister to my place of business, that’s my own damned business and not any of your business.” Was I overusing the word business? Fuck it. “So mind your own business.”

But she also can be sober, confident, and full of determination and plans for the future.

But realizing—okay, admitting—I loved Eric Sinclair didn’t solve anything. Real life was messy, and loving him didn’t magically undo the old problems and make everything wonderful and perfect.

So true, isn’t it? Especially after ranting at Sinclair a day before that.

So, the romance of Betsy and Eric comes to pass in ‘Undead and Unappreciated’. I don’t say ‘finally’, or ‘at last’, as it is the third book. I guess, the timing is okay, and I’m really curious about their future together. Betsy is surprisingly sober-minded and rational about it, Eric is sweet and open, and I love their natural and unpretentious ways with each other.

I Disliked

Betsy is saved again. It would be great to see her finally saving herself, without any help by others, to see her proving her strength, and superior abilities.

The prologue with the AA meeting, and Nick’s appearance – totally unnecessary.

Betsy’s viewpoint is very limited as she focuses only on herself. For example, I would love to know more about Sinclair. And I’m wondering whether Jessica doesn’t have a life of her own? I mean, does she never date? Or doesn’t she have other friends, or a cousin? Or some kind of occupation? Or hobbies? Anything. So the storytelling is one-sided, but at least it is not outstretched.

I Liked

Laura, the goody-goody spawn of the Devil, who “turned her back on her destiny”. Nice! And surprising too, I really didn’t see what was coming!

George, with the finest butt among the Fiends, playing with skeins of yarn. Weird. Anyway, his attraction to Betsy, and his endeavor to be near her, “creepy but kind of cute”. 🙂

Both Laura and George are promising and refreshing characters, I’m looking forward to seeing how their storylines progress.

The effects of the Book of the Dead on Betsy. The change of her thoughts is shown smartly and in a really terrifying way.

The story ends withAndrea and Daniel’s wedding ceremony. Great, I love it! Just a small episode, nothing cheesy, but it is overall romantic and nice.

All in allIt is an enjoyable read, and much better than the second one. Though the plot is not well-composed; it seems to consist of loose, random events in succession. I missed some intense erotica, and I hope Betsy’s viewpoint will broaden in the following books.

Today here is a quote fromUndead and Unappreciated by MaryJanice Davidson.

Me, I was ready to bite everybody in the room just for the relief of the screams. It was the usual collection of wannabe socialites and poseurs. Believe me, a bite on the neck would be doing every one of them a favor.

Being royally undead isn’t all it’s cracked up to bethere are still bills to be paid. Luckily, new Queen of the Vampires Betsy Taylor lands her dream job selling designer shoes at Macy’s.But when a string of vampire murders hits St. Paul, Betsy must enlist the help of the one vamp who makes her blood boil: the oh-so-sexy Sinclair. Now, she’s really treading on dangerous groundhigh heels and all.
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“Being a soulless denizen of the undead was really hard sometimes.”

My Review

I’m sad to say that the second book of the Undead series fell short of my expectations.
The first third of the book is pretty boring: Betsy has financial and termite problems, so she needs a job, and a new place to live.
Then a group of vampire hunters appears, killing vampires all over the city. Betsy is enlightened thatas a queen she has certain responsibilities.

“We’re getting reports of quite a few staked vampires.”“So?”She looked at me.“Ah, no,” I whined. “What, this is my problem?”“You’re the queen.”“Oh, so I have to protect the city’s vampires?”“The world’s vampires, actually,” she said gently.

On top of this, she gets some upsetting news from her stepmother, and a little girl as a companion, whose entity is a surprise only for Betsy, but not for the reader.

The intended turns of the story are too obvious – I mean the antagonist supporting the above mentioned vampire hunters, aka the Blade Warriors, aka the Broody Warthogs. Although their appearances are great and laugh-out-loud funny, I soon get tired of them.

I hoped for some development of Betsy, but she has the same naïve, self-centered, negligent attitude she had before. But even so, she is funny most of the time. 🙂

The final action scene is just lame; I expected a more spectacular ending. I don’t despise the fact that Betsy escapes almost miraculously, thanks to her being a supervamp, but that the whole scene, especially the revenge, is performed poorly.

All in allDespite the flat action, the predictable plot turns, and the uninteresting, but at least quickly disappearing new characters, Undead and Unemployed still has enough laugh-out-loud situations and sparkling dialogues to have a good time with it. A light and amusing read!